Samaritan International is a network of 20 European NGOs, a large proportion of which are active in disaster preparedness, civil defence and disaster management. Three million members, 140,000 volunteers and 45,000 full-time employees make up the foundation of the network and its expertise. Members contribute their many years of experience in the fields of social services, civil protection, rescue services, first aid training and international humanitarian aid to the joint work. Cooperation is also being steadily intensified in the areas of disaster reduction and the development of international civil protection systems. We at Samaritan International organise exchanges between experts in our "Competence Centre Civil Protection", coordinate joint projectwell as bilateral or multilateral collaboration in the event of an emergency.
Samaritan International regularly participates in European projects and is experienced both in the role of project coordinator and consortium partner. Alongside individual proposals and projects in collaboration with universities (e.g. the research topic of social resilience), the projects carried out to date have been predominantly practically orientated and focused on training and professional development as well as volunteer management. Our project cooperation was and is co-financed through various EU funding programmes (e.g. DG ECHO Prevention & Preparedness, EU Aid Volunteers, Erasmus+ adult and vocational training). Going forward, Samaritan International aims to make greater use of the network's broad expertise as a practioner in the field of civil security research with the objective of testing newly developed approaches and making our contribution to the ongoing development of civil protection and innovative solutions.
